The Christian agitation has started, which did not start over darker villainies like that of Gojra. Allama Qadri has rushed back from Canada; the new situation seems quite promising for his mission. Imran Khan’s regiment is active against the very Taliban he sympathises with. A media house which consistently predicts the fall of democracy and tones down every act of the holy Lions has suddenly opened full fire on the Punjabi Taliban. The honorable CJ has also rolled his sleeves. The Lions and Eagles are not running away; they will hit harder as the situation ripens. The game seems to be up again. “No conspiracy theories, please” we are told by those who see no conspiracy in such weird emergencies, because conspiracy theories are their exclusive domain.

After Waziristan and Gojra, it was Taftan, Quetta and Karachi. Then, this week they blessed Badami Bagh, Lahore. This time they covered walls with posters for days before they attacked; announcements were made in mosques that Christians will be slaughtered in the name of Allah, that their assets will be burned. One day before the “main event” the Christian locality was raided by these brave warriors as a rehearsal and as encouragement to more holy warriors to earn “sawab”. Provincial authorities told the Christian residents to vacate their homes before the announced burning. These hundreds of Christians had to be slaughtered because a boy of the locality had spoken some bad words. These bad words had been heard by just one good Muslim. Of course, no evidence was needed. So, the mosques went into full fury; Lions and Eagles swelled in rage.

Meanwhile, rumors circulated about the cancellation of the coming elections. Such “news” had circulated all through five years. They had intensified when Imran Khan followed by Allama Qadri demanded the dismissal of the elected governments, and after the Quetta and Karachi incidents.

Our hearts ache in helpless frustration when we see massacre after massacre with holy impunity. We groan unheard when again and again our “defenders” manipulate our constitution against our constitution and brilliantly arouse civilians against civilians: “Well if law and order is to be restored by us, then what use are you?” an innocently bored general asks the politicians at the end of an agitation. The politicians, who have saved their skins by obediently playing second fiddle for years, save their skins by submitting confessions for pardon. Great work! Great recipe for takeovers! The first step defeats the police and civil rule through strategic assets, then arouses national clamor, requesting a takeover.

We are more aware than ever before that as a people, we do not deserve the democratic option. We have to salute a savior. And two of them, are available: Army Generals or Taliban Generals. In fact, it is not a choice but a compulsion. They will settle affairs among themselves; such is perhaps our destiny. Allah seems to have chosen kings and soldiers as destiny of all Muslims for all times because prosperous Arabs and upper and middle class Muslims love them. In past centuries we had kings, like other communities. But generals and jihadists appeared in recent history to combat the heretical trends of democracy and human rights when these concepts emerged. Perhaps, that is why Muslim immigrants are struggling against the representative democracies of the West.

But it is not true that generals and jihadists overthrow every rule they serve. They are loyal to kings and Sheikhs and Imams. They hate only modern Muslim rulers who choose the heretical path of democracy.

Muslim kings ruled for centuries the Indian population which was deeply hostile to their rule most of the time. Throughout these centuries there were tiring wars, mass armed revolts and deep unrest which the army alone handled, because no ‘darogha’ or ‘kotwal’ could handle them. But no general ever took over.

The British, foreign rulers with a foreign religion, ruled us with a few thousand English soldiers and a large army of Muslims and other locals. Muslim soldiers faithfully fought to defend the British rule against Muslim jihadists led by Syed Ahmad Shaheed and others for half a century. Muslims finally fought for these non-Muslim masters in WW2. The British hanged the Muslim ulema, they massacred in Jallianwala, they hung freedom fighters, they hung Ilm Din, a far greater hero of the All India Muslims than any other self-appointed defender of the Prophet; he had been defended by Iqbal and Jinnah. But he was hanged without the need of a Martial Law.

Musaddiq, Soekarno, Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif were easy to be overthrown because they ruled through democracy. Ayatullahs of Iran, Suhartos and Ziaul Haqs can rule till their deaths with divine authority. They hanged and lynched hundred thousands of their innocent citizens in the name of Islam, they plunged their people in a meaningless militancy. They have brought misery and hypocrisy to their people. But no protest came from their generals, not even grumbling.

The unlimited rule of kings, holy men and foreign rulers has been a norm because armies served the state authority, because no general interfered with political power and no agency created independent civil brigades of assassins to create anarchy as a pretext for takeovers. Isn’t it grotesque that an intelligence network which wrestles with CIA and KGB, which can locate highly covered foreign agents, conveniently fails to locate its own leashed Lions of the Desert?

As helpless observes of our disaster, we can just cry. They can continue killing Christians and Ahmedi, Hazaras and Shias and target our finest men. The world seems to be on the side of these holy destroyers. The “conscientious West”, which comes out in hundreds of millions to protest against an invasion of Iraq, sleep in peace when our Lions and Eagles devour helpless humans.